


when there's too much to do

by mollivanders



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-27
Updated: 2011-01-27
Packaged: 2017-10-29 17:51:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/322542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mollivanders/pseuds/mollivanders
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When she’s told to curse Luna Lovegood in Dark Arts, she refuses.</p>
            </blockquote>





	when there's too much to do

**Author's Note:**

> **Title: when there's too much to do**  
>  Fandom: Harry Potter  
> Rating: G  
> Characters: Hannah Abbott, Ernie Macmillan, Ginny Weasley, Neville Longbottom  
> Author's Note: For the [Potter!Wars Comment Fic](http://anythingbutgrey.livejournal.com/785486.html?thread=14163022#t14163022). _Hannah Abbott, HBP or later_. JKR herself seems indecisive about Hannah Abbot's parentage but put an Abbott in Godric's Hollow cemetery so I inferred she was a Half-blood and would have been at Hogwarts in Year 7. Word Count - 1,316.  
>  Disclaimer: I own nothing.

  
_Where there's life, there's hope.  
Every day's a gift.  
Wishes can come true.  
Whistle while you work.  
So hard. All day.  
To be like other girls._   


Hannah is frozen from the moment she gets the news to the moment after the last clod of dirt covers her mother’s grave. She swings into a panic, drops to the grave and starts digging wildly with her hands before Ernie and Justin pull her back, whispering words of comfort in her ears.

She still fights them but the tears come before she can pull free and she hangs between them, staring at the people who’ve come to pay their respects. There are a few odd-looking wizards and witches in long cloaks ( _”In May!”_ she hears old Mrs. Cornwall whisper to her grown son) but it’s mostly her mother’s school friends, neighbors, churchgoers.

They laid her to rest next to her father, in a line of Abbots her mother slipped into and became part of. Hannah’s grandfather is waiting for her when everyone else is gone, when Justin and Ernie escort her home and promise to visit as soon as they can. Justin looks frightened more than anything and Hannah understands – he is worse off than she is, Muggle-born, and she and Ernie have warned him more than once to go into hiding.

She just forgot to tell her mother the same.

“It’s not your fault,” Ernie insists when he shows up that weekend, having snuck out to Hogsmeade and used the Floo at the Three Broomsticks. Professor Sprout will probably force him to spend the rest of term repotting Mandrakes but he shrugs off Hannah’s warning, helping himself to another slice of cake her grandmother left out for them.

“How’s Justin?” she asks instead, hoping to change the subject, and Ernie’s shoulders slump. “I don’t know if he’s coming back next year. Said something about looking…after his parents.” His voice drops an octave and Hannah looks through the kitchen window and spies the rich flower garden blooming there.

Her mother had loved gardening.

Ernie comes every weekend, even though Sprout _does_ sentence him to repotting Mandrakes, and brings her news of Hogwarts her grandparents won’t let slip. He’s the one who tells her about the battle at Hogwarts, of how Dumbledore had fallen, and he’s the one whose voice shakes when he worries that Harry Potter might not be able to save them this time.

She grips her hand in his, the lying _Daily Prophet_ scattered on the rug between them, and reminds him Harry’s gotten through worse. At least this time everyone believes him.

This time, even Ernie believes Harry when the _Prophet_ starts printing ads requesting information on Harry and his whereabouts at the time of Dumbledore’s death. Hannah tosses the paper in the bin as soon as she gets it but Ernie still comes over to rant in whispers, talks about fighting back some other way.

When they get the notice that all Pureblood and Half-blood students are required to come back to Hogwarts in September, she actually argues with her grandfather about it, ending with a blazing row and her locked in her room with her school things. Ernie’s wearing the same sullen look she is when he meets her on Platform 9 ¾ and Hannah breaks into a half-laugh at the absurdity of it all.

It’s like they’re school children and not of age at all.

But it’s still Hogwarts, and she hasn’t forgotten the halls or the smell of magic in the classrooms or the way food magically appears in the Great Hall. There are enough Hufflepuffs left that she and Ernie find strength in solidarity, but several of their classmates are missing.

The Gryffindor table looks strangely empty with only one redhead.

It’s not Hogwarts in many ways though, with Dark Arts classes and Snape swooping around like a great giant bat. Hannah’s blood boils and Ernie has to whisper a caution in her ear more than once about talking back and getting herself sent to the dungeons, but Hannah doesn’t really care anymore. Her mother’s been murdered and nobody’s been called to task for it. Someone _should_.

The first time they’re required to cast the Cruciatus Curse on their fellow students, Hannah balks and has to be sent to the hospital wing, her stomach still turning at the look on Zacharias’ Smith face as he cursed a Ravenclaw. While she’s there, she overhears Madam Pomfrey tending to Neville Longbottom.

“Your face, dear,” the nurse fusses and Hannah peers around the curtains between their beds, gasps at the deep cuts on Neville’s face and the way he stares past Madam Pomfrey, nodding. “They don’t hurt much,” he breathes and Hannah makes a decision.

When she’s told to curse Luna Lovegood in Dark Arts, she refuses.

It’s like nothing she’s ever felt before. Her skin is on fire, her blood is on fire, her bones are breaking and somewhere, over her screams, she can hear Ernie yelling for Carrow to stop, she’s had enough, let her go.

At some point, she can breathe again, her lungs still burning, and she catches Ernie’s eye, his terror for her written all over his face.

“I’m okay,” she manages, and Carrow twirls his wand threateningly. “Some more then?” he suggests and Hannah struggles to her feet.

“If you’ve got nothing better to do,” she bites and someone in the back of the class whoops lowly. She’s never said anything like that before, never stood up to a teacher. Even Snape sent her quivering to the back of Potions.

But her mother’s been murdered. Everything’s different now.

Her grandparents regularly send her post, carefully worded in her grandmother’s scrawl, with news of how the family’s doing and asking for updates on Hannah’s studies. There’s no question of what they’re being asked to do, just to keep up her grades and graduate with several N.E.W.T.S.

Hannah had completely forgotten about it. Ernie laughs shakily when she brings it up and points to a neglected looking stack of papers near their corner of the common room.

“I was already studying,” he tells her. “But why bother?”

“We have to bother,” Hannah says slowly, eyeing the stack of papers. “Because we’re going to need to know as much as possible to beat them. Harry’s going to need as much help as he can get.”

Ernie cracks his first real smile in a long time.

“You mean Hermione will,” he corrects and Hannah shares his amusement. “No kidding,” she agrees.

They gather several of the old D.A. students together in the library with hushed plans of _studying_ for their exams, annotated with winks and shoulder rubbing whenever an outsider isn’t around. Madam Pince eyes them like a hawk but she can’t tell them off for studying and it becomes a quiet act of defiance, just to do their best at good, honest work.

It’s a rainy day in November when Ginny Weasley finds Hannah in a hallway and, checking for any watchers, pulls her into an empty classroom.

“A couple of us are restarting Dumbledore’s Army,” she states matter-of-factly and Hannah’s eyes widen in surprise, both at the fact and that Ginny trusts her enough to tell her. “Consider it an amping up of your study group,” Ginny adds and Hannah grins.

“Oh, so you got that, did you?”

“We all have to pass our exams,” Ginny answers solemnly. “And if we know a little bit more, the better for us. Are you in?”

Suddenly it’s not about her mother’s death anymore. It’s not about the lack of mourners or the lack of Hogwarts being Hogwarts. It’s about Hannah and Ernie and everyone else who wants to live through this mess without losing themselves first.

“The old coins still work right?” Hannah asks, and Ginny grins. “Then we’ll be there.”

They leave the classroom separately, checking the corridor first, and as Hannah rushes off to Dark Arts sure to be tortured again, she feels a spring in her step.

A little hard work never hurt anyone.

_Finis_


End file.
